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Portland Marathon Training Week 11 – Workouts Recap (8/24-8/30)

Five more weeks until my first marathon! It’s been a milestone week since I ran my first 20 miler which will be the longest distance I run until the marathon. I must say it was a tough one but a pretty good first 20 mile run. I have another 20 miler planned in two weeks. I’m not sure how I’ll get it in, but here’s what I did last week:

Monday – I remember waking up a lot later than planned, since my alarm didn’t wake me up, and I did Focus T25 Total Body Circuit. I cut it close and got to work just in time. Tuesday – Ran 5 miles before heading up to Seattle. Wednesday – 8 miles. It was nice to run on this trail again by my parent’s place. Thursday – Running Rest Day. Ended up walking 2 miles and went geocaching.Friday – Ran 5 miles. Saturday – Ran 20 miles.The 20 miles were tough especially since it was a hilly course and rained for a good portion of it. The rain wasn’t bad and felt good at times. But when I finished I had the thoughts of how I would get through 6.2 more miles at a faster pace. My main goal is to finish the marathon but another goal is to finish under 4 hours. I ran most of it at a more comfortable pace since the program says to run the long runs slow. But I also looked at what RunKeeper had planned for me and they had an 18 miler planned with 3 fast miles towards the end and the last 3 miles steady. I decided to incorporate that in my 20 miler to see how I’d do and I ran miles 16-18 faster with splits 8:53/8:42/8:55 and then miles 19, 20 back to a steady pace and got 9:45 and 9:19. I’m actually pretty happy with how I did. But to do another 6.2 miles has me nervous. For me to get a time of 3:59:00, my average pace needs to be 9:07 per mile. There’s still five weeks left and one more 20 miler scheduled. I’ll see how I feel in a couple of weeks. 🙂

Sunday – Rest Day. I am feeling a little sore, and it seems to be my glutes.

Here’s a summary of what Hal Higdon’s plan had scheduled and what I did:

We are at a similar place in our training plans. I have 6 weeks left. I will be running my first 20 miler this weekend, although at a much slower pace. Yours is fantastic! I tried geocaching just this weekend. There were 2 in our neighborhood park. I bet your kids really enjoy it. Thanks for linking up with us today!

Very cool that we’ll be running our marathon about a week apart.Thanks!! I’m sure you’ll rock your 20 miles. I remember reading you did 19 already. The kiddos love geocaching. Hope you enjoyed it! Thanks for having the link up!

Aww I love the picture of you and your mini-me working out together! I so wish I could get my daughter to run with me, maybe one day! Oh wow, what an awesome pace for any mile but 20 that’s fantastic in my book! You have some beautiful places to run too. Thank you so much for linking up with us this week!

Good luck with the training. I am so impressed with ladies like you who have the motivation for marathons! I don’t think I could manage it myself. Keep up the great training and good luck for the big day!